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Authorities seek leads in stabbing, arson

The Columbia man bought two grave plots just before his body was found among the burning debris of the house he shared with his uncle.

Police said he was infirm, had trouble walking from old traffic accident injuries and once tried to kill himself with an overdose of medication.

But those leads went nowhere.

Jo Jo Dugger died by someone else’s hand.

His body was found as firefighters continued to extinguish the flames that destroyed the house and toppled its fiery remains into the basement, where Dugger had lived. There were many wounds that might have been made by shards of debris that rained down when the burning structure collapsed.

The next day, a medical examiner in Nashville said a knife found near Dugger’s badly charred body was “definitely” consistent with the multiple wounds to his left chest. It was about a half-inch wide and 3-4 inches long — long enough to pierce his lung and heart, which it did.

There was no soot in his nose, mouth, throat or lungs, so he had breathed his last breath before the fire.

“The cause of death is multiple knife stab wounds,” the medical examiner concluded in the incident report. “The best manner of death in my opinion is homicide.”

Columbia police are investigating the case as a first-degree murder and aggravated arson.

George Barnett Dugger, known to family and friends as Jo Jo, was murdered at age 40 on Aug. 27, 2008, and police are no closer to finding his killer today than in the first hours after he was found dead.

Many people have been interviewed, many leads chased without success, many theories of the crime considered, but none found to be better than the next.

The Jo Jo Dugger homicide is a case gone cold.

“I’d love for somebody to read this and pay attention to it and come forward,” Columbia Police Lt. Joel Gideon, one of the early investigators, said. “I’m confident there are people that know something about this.”

The mystery surrounding Dugger’s murder deepened when a little more than two years later, the bullet-riddled body of his uncle and landlord, George Foster, was found in the front seat of his car beside Richardson Lane at the top of a rise near Campbellsville Pike.

The murder of the 67-year old retiree is another cold case, one whose facts and investigative reports are contained in a thick binder shelved with other unsolved cases at the Maury County Sheriff’s Department.

Jerry Williams, the sheriff’s detective in charge of the Foster case, has worked with Columbia police looking for any link between the men’s violent deaths.

Gideon said the departments have shared case files hoping the collaboration would generate a lead in either case, but he declined to elaborate.

“Other than circumstance,” he said, referring to the fact that the victims were related and lived in the same house, “I can’t really comment on whether there’s evidence of a connection or not.”

All options and all theories of the Dugger case are still open, Gideon said.

Was the fire set to cover his murder? Possibly. Did the same killer or killers murder both men? Possibly. Did they have any enemies in common or on their own? Possibly, although relatives were at a loss when asked if either man had any. No, family members said, none that they were aware. But either or both men certainly had at least one.

The facts of the Dugger homicide as they are known today are contained in the pages of an incident report filed by investigators after they responded to the fire at 1425 Lyon St. and supplemental reports added to the file in the months after.

The fire was reported about 2 a.m. George Foster was at the scene and told investigators that he had left for work at Saturn about 8:45 the night before. He said he spoke with his nephew before leaving their home and that Jo Jo was fine.

Dugger’s mother, Susan Dugger, was also at the scene and said she last spoke to her son by phone between 9-10 p.m. the night before, and that he also sounded fine to her. A check of phone records showed the call took place at 9:09 p.m. and that it was the last call to or from the residence.

Neither Susan Dugger nor George Dugger’s sister, Katie Scott, could not be reached for comment for this story.

Besides firefighters and Columbia police, state bomb and arson investigators also worked the scene, where devastation of the house was near complete. A K-9 unit found nothing of use.

Investigators learned that Dugger had attempted suicide in 2006 and was treated at Maury Regional Medical Center. They also found that Dugger had recently bought two grave sites in Polk Memorial Gardens, but further inquiry showed that he had done so in response to a newspaper ad offering a low price. He bought one for himself and one for his mother. Cemetery employees said he was in good spirits during the transaction.

Relatives, friends and acquaintances were interviewed, and none provided any leads pointing to who had killed Dugger.

State investigators determined that the fire started on or around a couch in the basement where he died, but the exact location of his body was not detailed in the reports.

Gideon urged anyone with information about Dugger’s murder to call the Columbia Police Department’s 24-hour line at (931) 388-2727, the Columbia Safe Tip Line at (931) 380-2930 or Crimestoppers at (931) 381-4900. Crimestoppers offers rewards of up to $1,000 for evidence that leads to arrest and conviction.

Williams said information about the George Foster murder can be phoned to the Maury County Sheriff’s Detective Division at (931) 375-8693.

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